


[Ai]tai

by Tokei_B



Category: Uta no Prince-sama
Genre: F/M, M/M, Reader-Insert, any gender you like, how do you title
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-25
Updated: 2019-02-25
Packaged: 2019-11-05 09:15:35
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,981
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17916014
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tokei_B/pseuds/Tokei_B
Summary: Ai/ needy!reader idol S/OIt's been a long, long day. You miss Ai, but your next date is three weeks away. To alleviate your loneliness you text him,  despite knowing that he won't see it until he's done with work which is hours away.





	[Ai]tai

**Author's Note:**

> 会いたい (aitai) means "I miss you" or literally "I want to see you" in Japanese.
> 
> ...I am so sorry for the corniness of the title, my naming skills are non-existent, please don't let me ever have children.

It’s been a long, long day.

You click on your phone, stare at the lock screen, click it off again. Both your lock and home screens are either photos of scenery or something just as innocuous. Your manager made sure to drill into your head  _ precautions precautions precautions _ , just in case you get careless and a curious staff member happens to look and see and then you’re in trouble again.

You’ve lost track of the number of times you’ve repeated this action.

The ceiling of your room looks strangely empty. You’ve seen on TV love hotels with mirrors on their ceilings. You’ve also watched programs about super fans who plaster every inch of their room with images of their idols, from the floor to the walls to the ceiling.

You wonder what it would be like to have a life-sized poster of your boyfriend up there. Horribly embarrassing, yet strangely comforting at the same time. At least you’d get to see him everyday though, even if the same doesn’t go for him.

You’re an idol, he’s an idol. Everyone you know is an idol, save for your schoolmates. Perhaps they’re in the entertainment industry as well and you just weren’t aware of it.

Fans are the lifeblood of this industry. Fantasies are what fuels fans and opens their wallets. There’s a reason why Shining explicitly bans romantic relationships in his stable of talents. You understand. Ai understands.

But your understanding of this rule doesn’t reach your heart.

(The rule isn’t as ironclad as it once was. It started showing cracks when a veteran who had been with the agency since it was first formed held a press conference and announced that they would be retiring to look after a family that no one had any idea even existed until that day.

President Shining and subsequently every manager in Shining Productions had come down hard and fast on everyone else after that. Your schedule was packed for months. Ai and the rest of Quartet Night were practically kept up in the air for half a year, flying all over the country and sometimes out of it on non-stop promotional tours and international training sessions. 

You don’t know what were the consequences that idol had to face after that, but you can’t deny that a tiny seed of hope was planted in your chest after that day.)

You know that Ai won’t be done until the early hours of the morning at least. But you click on your phone again and tap on the email icon.

_ I miss you. I want to see you. _

Two sentences. So many emotions. Your eyes stop making sense of the words after the tenth read through. You know that sending this email is a meaningless action. Ai wouldn’t see it until he was done, which was hours away, and when he finally did he would probably tell you to be patient and include a practical reminder of your next date. 

The next time your schedules matched enough for the two of you to meet without suspicion is the next month, three weeks away.

You’ve waited longer to see him. It had taken both of you two years of being blatantly ignorant of your attraction to each other before things finally moved along. There had been the physical equivalent of the two of you being shoved into each others faces with someone yelling “JUST KISS AND GET IT OVER WITH”.

You were stunned, but didn’t push him away.

Ai didn’t have any reaction at first, but when he finally came to his senses he looked as if he’d just been hit with an epiphany. Grabbing your arm, he had pulled you out of the room for a more private confession.

Both your managers had been beyond horrified.

You are tired of waiting for your schedules to match up. You are tired of walking past him in the agency corridors and just having to get by with the normal junior-senior greetings. You are tired of having to give the same scripted answers to the same questions: “What’s your idea date like?” “What would you do for your wedding?” You would like those scenarios to be reality if they would let you, please.

The topic of marriage has never come up between you and Ai, but you have a feeling that there wouldn’t be much difference between now and if it happened. Both of you have somehow become so settled into being the old married couple that the older members of your respective groups couldn’t stand it. (“You’re still young and it’s a forbidden relationship! Where’s the excitement? Where’s the passion?” “Reiji, shut up.”)

You send the message anyway.

You feel a bit better after doing so, for some reason. But the loneliness is still there. You don’t know whether to be glad that the chances of you meeting him during work are almost abysmally low for the next few weeks, because you have a feeling that if your current state carried over to work the results would probably lead to you having to leave the agency.

Still lying down on the floor (someone somewhere had told you that the floor was actually better for your back than your bed and it had stuck with you), you slap your cheeks lightly in an attempt to snap out of it. Rolling over on your stomach, you kick up your legs in muted frustration and wonder if there was anyone you could go and bother at this hour. Anything would be better than aimlessly waiting for a message that would never contain the answer that you wanted to hear the most right now.

Your phone vibrates. It’s a reply.

_ I’m done with work. Do you want to come over? _

You had no idea that you could go from lying down to being upright that fast.

*

You latch onto Ai the moment he opens the door. He prudently closes it again quickly and drags both himself and you hanging on to him to the living room.

“We finished early today. I was going to email you, but you beat me to it.”

You climb into his lap and bury your face in his chest, your arms tight around him. Just being able to feel him, to cling to him like this without reservations is enough to start filling the yawning gap inside you. Feeling that words would sully this deep contentment, you don’t reply.

Ai doesn’t press you for an answer. One of his hands begins stroking your back while his free hand massages the back of your neck. You sink deeper into his arms. The steady thrumming of his heart under your ear is another source of comfort. You feel more at home like this than in your own room.

When you finally recover enough to look up, you notice that Ai’s head is on your shoulder, the lower half of his face pressed into whatever he can get of your neck. His breathing is slow, his eyes closed in what you think is contentment. Both his arms have fallen to rest loosely around your waist. It’s then that you notice that he still has his jacket on. You must have arrived just as he had stepped through the door himself.

Sensing you finally moving, he props his chin up on your shoulder and looks at you lopsidedly.

“Your heart rate has gone back to normal. I take it that you’re feeling better now?”

You nod.

“You’re not normally like this. Did something happen today?”

You want to tell him about how you’re tired of disguises and scripted answers. You think of telling him that maybe you’ll quit, maybe both of you should leave Shining and go over to Raging Entertainment instead. 

(For once your crippling self-doubt that you will never be good enough to go solo is silenced by your need to just be with Ai. You have no doubts that Ai would do perfectly well even by himself.)

You want to be able to hold hands with him out in the open, not hidden behind your backs or under the table. You want to be able to look straight at the cameras, flash a smile and maybe even a victory sign to the ever-present paparazzi, one arm curled around Ai’s, and not get hell and more for it when the photos are published.

Instead you curl your legs up into his lap and rest your head against his shoulder.

“Can we pretend to be a normal couple, just for tonight?” you ask, one hand reaching for his. His fingers slip readily into the spaces between yours. His hand is smooth and warm. Ai is always warm.

His voice has a quizzical note in it. “What do you mean by pretend?”

You shrug, pushing down your real desires. “I don’t know.” You sigh into his collar. “Sorry, I’m being needy today. Just put up with me for tonight, okay? I’ll be back to normal tomorrow.”

Something surges up inside you at the lie in your last statement.

“I just miss you so much.” The words drop out of your mouth softly. A weight lifts off your chest and you can physically feel yourself getting lighter.

There’s nothing but silence. You wonder if you’ve overdone it, if this is it, this is the day that Ai finally tells you that perhaps both of you should take a step back and reconsider this.

You can feel the tears prickling your eyes when Ai finally replies.

“What a coincidence.” His hand is under your chin, his lips demanding against yours. You yield willingly, surprise and relief making you go limp in his arms. When he finally releases you there’s a look of satisfaction in his eyes.

“Apparently our emotions were in sync,” he muses, almost to himself. “It would seem that a month of not seeing each other is the maximum length of time for us. It’s rather unpleasant, however…”

He kisses you again. This time you lean into it, reciprocating his efforts.

“…The payoff from finally settling it is quite rewarding.”

You barely hear what he’s saying, your heart beating so loudly that you’re pretty sure he can hear it as well. You don’t know what exactly is making your blood race so fast, the unexpected kisses or the fact that he felt the same way that you did.

You hadn’t really thought that Ai could possibly understand how you felt. Maybe it’s because of his perfectionism, the fact that he’s flawless when it comes to work, and work is really the only place that you have any chance of seeing him these days, honestly speaking.

The only thing you know for sure is that the adrenaline rush from just now and Ai’s lingering warmth on your lips have completely washed away all the fears and insecurities which had been plaguing you until just now.

“You wanted to be like normal couples today, right?”

The next thing you know you’re lifted up in his arms. Ignoring your surprised protests, Ai continues talking as he makes his way out of the living room.

“It’s too late for dinner, so the only things left are a bath and bed.” He looks down at you. “You have the day off tomorrow, don’t you?”

You nod mutely in reply, but then you remember that he doesn’t.

“It’s late,” you remind him, one hand cupping his cheek in concern. “I don’t want you to tire yourself out because of me.”

He turns his head slightly to press his mouth against your palm. 

“My schedule tomorrow only starts later in the morning. I will have more than enough time to rest.” The movement of his lips on your skin and the vibrations of his voice through your hand sends a thrill through you, and he notices. “You will stay the night, won’t you?”

There’s no way you can refuse.

  
  



End file.
